'Ronin' a handsomely rendered samurai tale

"47 Ronin" PG-13 — Very violent, yet showing little gore, this elegant samurai saga, based on a Japanese legend, will please many high-schoolers who like old-style martial arts films.

Middle-schoolers with strong stomachs for implied screen violence may like it, too, but perhaps not in 3-D. Keanu Reeves plays a "half-breed" named Kai, a preternaturally gifted fighter living in a mythical version of 19th- century Japan. Kai cannot be a samurai because of his outcast status. He loves Mika (Ko Shibasaki), daughter of Lord Asano (Min Tanaka), and she loves him, but the two cannot be together.

When the great Shogun (Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa) visits their district, he's accompanied by power-hungry Lord Kira (Tadanobu Asano). A shape-shifting Witch (Rinko Kikuchi) in league with Lord Kira causes an incident that offends the Shogun, who is led to believe that his host, Lord Asano, is responsible.

The Shogun requires Lord Asano to commit suicide as a traditional punishment, and dubs Asano's samurai as outcasts, called Ronin, banning them from fighting. The wronged Lord Asano's loyal second-in-command, Lord Oishi (Hiroyuki Sanada), vows secretly that he and the other Ronin will avenge their lord's unfair death. Freed after a year in captivity, Lord Oishi finds Kai enslaved, breaks him out, and asks him to join the Ronin to exact an ingeniously staged revenge.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Much violence, little blood: We see samurai warriors run through with swords. Others, in addition to Lord Asano, are condemned to commit traditional suicide using daggers. Little of the suicide scenes actually appear on camera, but they are strongly implied. There are also two implied beheadings. Kai fights a bull-like monster and a dragon, gutting them with his sword, though again, no blood.

"Grudge Match" PG-13 — The language is too crude and profane for middle-schoolers, but why would they want to see a movie about a pair of washed-up 60-something boxers anyway?

On the other hand, while "Grudge Match" is corny and formulaic, its co-stars Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro carry so much cinematic history and charisma with them, the film proves a guilty pleasure. Some high-schoolers may like it.

You can't watch these guys as aging boxers and not think of Stallone as his fictional pugilist hero in "Rocky" (PG, 1976, plus sequels) and De Niro as the real-life Jake La Motta in "Raging Bull" (R, 1980). It's Pittsburgh. Stallone plays ex-fighter Henry "Razor" Sharp, about to be laid off from his job in a steel mill. He left the ring 30 years earlier in the wake of a feud with his boxing nemesis, Billy "The Kid" McDonnen (De Niro). A hard-drinking, womanizing jerk who now owns a car dealership, Kid seduced Razor's lady love, Sally (Kim Basinger in the present), back in the day. She had a son by him.

The child is now a college sports coach named B.J. (excellent Jon Bernthal) with a young son (Camden Gray) of his own. But Sally and B.J. haven't seen Kid or Razor since that betrayal decades ago, nor have the two ex-fighters crossed paths. Then a mouthy sports promoter (hilarious Kevin Hart) gets the idea of reuniting the two in a geriatric grudge match.

An encounter between them turns into fisticuffs and goes viral. Suddenly the idea looks like a hit. Razor trains with his old pal "Lightning" (Alan Arkin), and Kid works out with B.J. after meeting him for the first time. Issues are sorted out amid the punches.

THE BOTTOM LINE: The script includes a nearly constant barrage of crude language, midrange profanity and toilet humor, pushing the PG-13 limit. The S-word gets a good workout, and there is plenty of semi-crude sexual slang. Adults tell a child that a common sexual abbreviation stands for "butterscotch jellybeans." The film includes an implied, nongraphic sexual situation in partial undress. One character drinks a lot.

"Frozen" PG — Lovely for most kids 6 and older, this animated 3-D musical reimagines Hans Christian Andersen's "The Snow Queen" with memorable characters, high (and low) hilarity, stunning imagery, and Broadway-caliber songs. Some scenes may be too menacing in 3-D for under-6s, and even 6-year-olds may need reassurance at times

In the Scandinavian kingdom of Arendelle live two little princesses, Anna and her older sister Elsa. Elsa has a gift:

With a wave of her hands she can fill a room with snow and ice to play on. One day, she nearly freezes her little sister by mistake. The spell is reversed and Anna's memory of the incident erased, so she doesn't understand why Elsa now avoids her. Soon after, the king and queen are lost at sea, so when Elsa comes of age (now voiced by Idina Menzel) she's crowned queen. Anna (Kristen Bell) longs for romance at the coronation ball and falls for a visiting prince named Hans (Santino Fontana).

Queen Elsa refuses to let Anna marry so fast, and in her pique, accidentally unleashes her powers. Leaving Arendelle in permanent winter, Elsa flees to the mountains and conjures an ice palace in which to live out her days. Anna goes after her with help from a cute ice seller.

A short titled "Get A Horse!" precedes "Frozen." It cleverly merges early images of Mickey Mouse (using Walt Disney's original Mickey voice) with modern animation.

THE BOTTOM LINE: No one dies, but the film has life-or-death moments at the edges of cliffs. Soldiers hunt Elsa with crossbows, and she nearly impales them with ice shards. She creates a roaring snow monster to chase away Anna and Kristoff, who are also pursued by wolves. Anna nearly dies of the ice curse and a villain threatens her with a sword. There's a little toilet humor.

"Walking With Dinosaurs" PG — Laced with humor, adventure and information, this animated 3-D dinosaur adventure will divert kids 8 and older, even if adults find it cloyingly contrived (which it is, rather). Some of the dangers it portrays could be a bit too much for under-8s, though seeing it in 2-D would mute that.

The young dinosaur hero and his herd face vicious forest fires, hungry predators, perilous ice, violent rivalries, and parental loss. The film starts with a present-day human prologue: A boy (Charlie Rowe) and girl (Angourie Rice) drive through the wilds of Alaska with their uncle (Karl Urban), a paleontologist. The boy doesn't want to hunt for dinosaur bones and stays near the truck. A talking bird (voice of John Leguizamo) flies up and tells him a tale, set 70 million years earlier, about Patchi (voice of Justin Long), a perky Pachyrhinosaurus.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Jokes about dinosaur poop, vomit and flatulence are frequent. The forest fire, predatory attacks, and a scene in which some of the herd fall through a frozen lake are scary. Most of this is more implied than graphic, but it's intense in 3-D. Male dinos have head-butting contests.

"The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty" PG — Kids 10 and older, especially if they can enjoy quieter films, will find much pleasure in director/star Ben Stiller's gentle update of James Thurber's classic 1939 story. Practically nothing but the title of the original (or the 1947 film) remains, but that's OK. They've taken Thurber's idea about a daydreaming milquetoast and reimagined it.

Stiller's Walter Mitty is a 40-something drone who keeps track of photographic negatives in the bowels of Life Magazine's New York office. His co-workers chuckle at Walter's tendency to zone out. He adores a new employee, Cheryl (Kristen Wiig), and becomes tentative friends with her and her son Rich (Marcus Antturi), but he can't summon the nerve to ask her out. Instead, he imagines himself as an action hero, sweeping her off her feet. Walter's latest assignment is to provide the negative for a final print cover before Life goes all-digital. Intrepid photographer Sean O'Connell (Sean Penn) marked the cover photo among the shots he most recently sent in. But Walter can't find it. He needs to talk to O'Connell, but the man is notoriously elusive. A snarky new boss (Adam Scott) keeps asking Walter about the negative. Walter puts him off and decides to go after O'Connell — a trip that takes him to Greenland, Iceland, and the Afghan Himalayas.

THE BOTTOM LINE: In Walter's early fantasies of action-movie style explosions and chases, we never see people hurt. Walter's new boss belittles him and flicks paper clips at him. Early on, the film gently touches on depression. Walter goes up with a very drunk helicopter pilot, outruns a potential volcanic eruption, and skateboards sans helmet down a highway. He also climbs with Sherpas in the Himalayas. The script includes mildly crude expressions and very mild sexual innuendo.